 and becomes even better through the course of this new journey. The character-based storytelling is exceptional on any level, but most especially for such a violent, previously nihilistic, action game franchise. Although the above is all true, judging the game as a whole it's clear it's not quite so perfectly formed as its predecessor. The primary problem, oddly, is the plot, which is so vaguely sketched that at times it seems almost non-existent. At the beginning of the game Kratos and his son Atreus – who has learnt his Nordic name is Loki – are merely trying to stay out of everyone's way, since their actions in the previous game caused the s){kind=link}
The biggest PS4 and PS5 exclusive of the year is finally here but can Ragnarök live up to the spectacle of the previous God Of War?
The 2018 God Of War deserves to be remembered as one of the greatest franchise reinventions of all time. Despite the subtitle-less name it was not a reboot, but instead a direct continuation of the story of Kratos – a god of war from Ancient Greece who up until that point had been one of gaming’s most loathsomely amoral protagonists. The games are almost unplayable nowadays, for anyone that’s not a terminally moody teenager, and yet they had to have existed in order for the new game to happen, and for Kratos to embark on one of the greatest redemptive journeys that gaming has ever seen.
If God Of War had been some low budget indie game its themes would not have seemed so surprising, but it was a massive budget AAA PlayStation exclusive and Sony deserve just as much credit for publishing it as Santa Monica Studio do for making it. By the end of the game Kratos was transformed, from a heartless monster into not only a loving father but someone that wanted to seek out and help other people.
You might think that leaves nowhere for the sequel, on both PlayStation 5 and 4, to go but while, at the start of this new game, Kratos has become overly protective of his son he’s still a good person (well, god) and becomes even better through the course of this new journey. The character-based storytelling is exceptional on any level, but most especially for such a violent, previously nihilistic, action game franchise.
Although the above is all true, judging the game as a whole it’s clear it’s not quite so perfectly formed as its predecessor. The primary problem, oddly, is the plot, which is so vaguely sketched that at times it seems almost non-existent. At the beginning of the game Kratos and his son Atreus – who has learnt his Nordic name is Loki – are merely trying to stay out of everyone’s way, since their actions in the previous game caused the start of Ragnarök, an end of the world myth that seems to be everywhere in pop culture at the moment.